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Volleyball11/05/2015

Iran start pre-season friendlies in Finland

Kuortane, Finland, May 11, 2015 – Iran arrived in Finland on Sunday, May 10, to start the first leg of their 36-day trip prior to the 2015 FIVB Volleyball World League, with a training camp at the Olympic Training Centre of Kuortane.

The Iranian squad is scheduled to play three friendly matches with Finland from May 14 to 16; the last two matches will be played in Leppavirta. Iran will continue with another training camp in the Czech Republic from May 17 to 24, and play two friendly matches before they leave for the United States.

“Finland has made a remarkable progress over the last 10 years,” Iran coach Slobodan Kovac. “It would be good for Iran’s preparation to play the Finnish team.”

“This is our second day in Finland and we are going to start the training sessions from today,” Kovac added. “There are no serious physical problems in the team, only small injuries of two opposite players. But we will try our best to reach maximum for our World League matches.”

Last year, Iran finished sixth in the FIVB Volleyball Men’s World Championship in Poland and placed fourth in the World League.

"We did not play well at the end of the World Championship in Poland last year because we did not have enough knowledge about our opponents Germany and France, which were not as well-known as USA, Italy, Russia or Brazil,” Kovac said. “We played very good volleyball against these teams. This is a good opportunity to understand how important it is to be ready to play every team and remain strong in each moment."

Kovac will take the opportunity in the training camp to evaluate his players, especially the new faces and young players, who will be considered in the current team and in their future competitions. The training camps and friendly matches will allow these players to adapt to his training system.

“I have some new players that I would like to test in these friendly matches,” Kovac said. “If we want to take new steps forward, we must try harder and be fully prepared to eliminate our weak points. There are some new faces and young players who would be very good for the Iranian team, not only in the future but also for the current team.

“This is good opportunity to play more friendly matches to have better knowledge about the strengths of new players. We are not concerned about the results. Our focus is to bring more consistency to these players so we may have some new players for the team in the World League.

Iran will be in Pool B of Group 1 with USA, Poland and Russia in the preliminary round of the 2015 World League.